This is for US

We celebrated Indigenous People’s Day on Monday, but it was today, October 12, that Columbus and his armada of goons first washed up on Taino land in 1492.

This past weekend was bittersweet. It was a reminder of indigenous resistance, but also, of how much we as a people have lost. I was in Providence on Monday, and as such, I couldn’t help but think of all the Pokanokets (Wampanoags), Narragansetts, and Pequots whom the English slaughtered during their various wars against us. I think of how Pokanoket identity was criminalized: under a colonial-era Rhode Island law that wasn’t repealed until 2006 (yes, 2006), one could be legally killed for claiming to be Pokanoket.

And yet, here I am—a Pokanoket in 2016, writing in time in which it’s controversial to say my Black life matters, in which riot police brutalize indigenous people protecting the waters at Standing Rock. How much has really changed since the Santa María?

Not much. Including indigenous resistance to colonial violence.

On Monday, I woke up to gorgeous sunshine. I prayed, thanking the Creator that I’m here and the ancestors for having been here. And then, if we’re being real, I plugged my phone into the nearest speakers and started playing Solange’s “F.U.B.U.” Because the waumpeshau holiday for Columbus is about settler colonialism and settler identity. Because my people were here first, and we’re still here. Because this is for us.